


Shit Happens

by TheVoiceofWrath (meet_your_fate)



Series: Prompt Fill Roundup Autumn 2013 [11]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, Hopeful Ending, M/M, POV Derek, Post season 3a, ghost!stiles, under consideration for possible expansion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-06
Updated: 2013-10-06
Packaged: 2017-12-28 13:45:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/992658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meet_your_fate/pseuds/TheVoiceofWrath
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: <i>angst, death, ghosts</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Shit Happens

**Author's Note:**

> This one, of all the prompts in this bunch, is my absolute favorite. I've been thinking of expanding it into a full length fic if there's enough interest out there, so be sure to let me know if you'd like to read more in this 'verse!

Derek hadn’t meant to be gone for so long. He just wanted a little time to heal, to forget everything that happened with Jennifer. Julia; whatever her name was. It’s only been a few months. But he comes back and finds Beacon Hills barely holding on by a thread. Scott’s pack has apparently been battling all kinds of evil and Derek didn’t even _know_. No one told him.

But _he_ never called to check in, did he? Does that make this his fault? If he’d known, if he’d stayed, would it have made a difference? Would Stiles still be alive? Scott tries to make out like there was nothing to be done, like Stiles went out in a blaze of glory and that’s just that, but Derek knows better; he could’ve been here to keep Stiles from trying to be a goddamn hero.

He supposes it isn’t _trying_ anymore if one dies in an  _actual_ heroic fashion, rescuing children from a witch’s basement and getting stabbed in the heart for the trouble.

Derek just wishes— _god_ , he wishes for _so much_. He wishes Stiles hadn’t died thinking Derek had just up and left them forever. He wishes he’d maybe thanked Stiles a few times, for doing all the things Derek took for granted. The research and stuff. For getting on people’s asses when they needed it…

So, okay, maybe it’s a little too much to be going to the cemetery to talk at Stiles’s tombstone. He knows Stiles isn’t in there, knows Stiles can’t _hear_ , but still he goes because this is what humans _do_. Wolves run and howl when they grieve. They commune with nature because _that’s_ where spirits are. They aren’t six feet under. But this is what _humans_ do and human is what Stiles was. He feels awkward standing there, though, looking at Stiles’s headstone and _real name_. How is that even pronounced? And it’s right next to a couple’s stone; Claudia Anne Stilinski, loving wife and mother, with empty space for the Sheriff to rest beside her someday hopefully very far off. Derek really, _really_ doesn’t belong here. Should he have brought flowers? No, no, that’s dumb. Stiles wouldn’t want flowers.

He clears his throat. “Stiles. Um… I’m sorry? I should’ve been here. I’m just… I’m really sorry…”

A beat passes and then, “That’s it? Seriously? I’ve been waiting like twenty minutes while you brooded sorrowfully for _that_?”

Derek whips around and sees _Stiles_ , sitting cross legged. In midair. He blinks.

Stiles sighs and waves a dismissive hand. “Yeah, it’s a lot to take in. I don’t usually manifest completely because it takes a lotta mojo and I try to save my power up in case of emergencies… But, really? You stand here over my body for all that time and you just go with, ‘Whoops, my bad’? _Lame_.”

Derek is going to ignore the insulting part. “How are you here right now?”

"I was killed by a witch with her fancy witch dagger, dude; of _course_ my spirit is going to be stuck on the mortal plane forever. It’s cool, though. Lydia and I made a talisman to bind me properly, so I won’t go all psycho vengeful ghost and I can be summoned and stuff. We’re working on amping up my strength so I can be more useful. It’s easier for me to appear to her for some reason. Probably the banshee thing…”

"Why didn’t Scott tell me that you’re a _ghost_?” Derek demands. He’d have felt a little, tiny bit less terrible if he’d known _some_ version of Stiles is still around.

Stiles shrugs. “He doesn’t think I’m real yet. That might be because I came to him the first few times when he was really low and he decided I’m an hallucination… But that’s okay. He’ll come around and, in the meantime, I’m still here to protect him when I can. Where the hell have _you_ been?”

"Around. Traveling. I didn’t mean to just abandon—"

"Nope. Not going there, dude, this isn’t the blame game," Stiles says, his feet finally drifting to the ground as he ‘stands’ properly. He’s wearing flannel and jeans and his ridiculous Chuck Taylor’s; he looks exactly how Derek would picture Stiles if Stiles were stuck one way for all eternity. It’s almost funny, except for how Stiles is _dead_.

Stiles moves closer and holds up a hand, nodding at it expectantly. Derek’s brows rise questioningly.

Stiles sighs. “Just do it, dude.”

Derek rolls his eyes and lifts his hand to Stiles’s. There’s a strange tingling sensation in his palm and he can _almost_ feel Stiles against his skin. Stiles pulls a face, biting his lip in concentration and—

Contact. Stiles laces their fingers until they’re actually holding hands and grins at him. Derek feels a little breathless. “I’m glad you’re back. I missed your cranky face.”

"Stiles…"

"Don’t be sad, okay? I’m still around and that’s what matters. Plus, dude, I’ll be young and pretty forever. How cool is that?" Stiles jokes, obviously trying to cheer Derek up. Which is just _awful_ because Stiles is _dead_.

"I don’t know about _pretty_ ,” Derek grumbles, trying for humor.

“ _Please_ , you _know_ this shimmering, ethereal ghost thing so works on me. I make dead look _good_.”

"Hopefully you don’t get oozy like in The Frighteners."

Stiles grins. “That’s a bitchin’ movie, dude. _So_ glad you don’t actually live under a rock when it comes to that kind of stuff. I _can_ do that flickering thing that ghosts do in, like, Supernatural and modern horror movies. It’s pretty bad ass.”

"I bet it is…"

Stiles’s body seemingly begins to fade, like a dimming light.

"Do you have to go?" Derek asks.

Stiles nods. “Being corporeal for more than a couple minutes is really hard. I’m getting better, though. Practicing and working out my ghost muscles. I’ll come see you soon. Maybe try telling Scott I actually exist? He doesn’t handle it well when I try… Crap, yeah, I gotta run. It’ll take me a while to regather my atoms or whatever and time passes differently when you’re dead, so, it might be a while.”

"That’s fine," Derek assures. "I’m still sorry you’re dead."

Stiles shrugs and grins again. “What are you gonna do, you know? Shit happens.”

As Stiles fades away completely and the hand in Derek’s disappears, Derek could swear he feels a tingling flutter against his cheek. A kiss…? Yeah, Derek thinks that was a kiss. Derek doesn’t know if Stiles can still see him, but he flushes a little bit and the tips of his ears turn red. He’s just short of scuffing his boot on the ground. After a few minutes, he makes his way out of the cemetery. He can at least help Stiles out by talking to Scott. No reason for Scott to waste this strange second chance they’ve been given by insisting Stiles is an hallucination brought on by guilt…

**Author's Note:**

> Come follow me on [tumblr](http://thevoiceofwrath.tumblr.com/), let's be bros! ♥


End file.
